1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to multicast accounting control systems and broadband access servers, and more specifically, to a multicast accounting control system and a broadband access server for providing a usage-based accounting of multicasting in multicast distribution.
2. Description of the Related Art
It has been studied to charge each user for a multicast distribution service on an as-used basis.
An accounting server which references an authentication log of a multicast authentication server and charges each multicast user by the amount of distribution time is disclosed (for example, see Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2003-333580).
The conventional technique allows each user to be charged by the amount of multicast distribution time, but the listening-or-viewing charge is not differentiated with bit rates depending on distributed programs.
A content management server dynamically selects an accounting server, and the accounting server collects accounting generation information of multicast users and charges each user on an as-used basis is disclosed (for example, see Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2004-127121). For the accounting server, the user must take the trouble of sending the accounting generation information. The accounting generation information used for the conventional usage-based accounting method could be tampered by the user.
An apparatus which creates transmission accounting information of a terminal sending or receiving a content on the basis of information accumulated in a multicast transmission apparatus, such as a reception date and time, a sender IP address, a receiver IP address, and a packet size is disclosed (for example, see Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2003-37627). The apparatus accumulates the packet size of each content, but if different reception terminals join or leave a multicast group at different timings, it would be difficult to charge each reception terminal by the number of distributed bytes, the number of distributed packets, and others.
A content accounting system which charges a user by the data size, resolution, output method, and others when the user performs an operation such as downloading or outputting a content is disclosed (for example, see International Application Publication Pamphlet No. 2002/052469). The content accounting system holds content charges based on a content size, a resolution, and others, but the collection of content size and the accounting are not disclosed in detail.